James O'Barr

Writer and artist James O'Barr created his character The Crow in the early '80s as a response to a personal tragedy. A self-taught artist, O'Barr first worked on his story of love, death, and retribution while stationed in Berlin with the Marines, where he was on loan to the Army to illustrate hand-to-hand combat manuals. (Warning: Don't get James into a fight; he knows which bones to break.) Inspired by such diverse sources as the French poets Georges Bataille, Antonin Artaud and Arthur Rimbaud, musicians like Iggy Pop, Ian Curtis and Robert Smith and the writers Lewis Carroll, Edgar Allan Poe and A.A. Attanasio, James O'Barr conceived the character of The Crow as a supernatural force driven by equal parts love and revenge.
"After someone very close to me was killed by a drunk driver, I joined the Marines. I just wanted to stop thinking and have some structure in my life. But I was still filled with such rage and frustration that I had to get it out before it destroyed me. One day I just began drawing